Yavapai Lodge — Hotel in Tuba City

The short version: many staff members we interacted with were wonderful. Our experience checking in and subsequent interactions at the front desk made this stay incredibly difficult and frustrating. Because of this, I cannot recommend a stay.

So we’ve had our room for 5 booked for at least a month, and we show up to collect our key the night of our reservation. We are directed to another building to get to our room and told a rollaway would be at our room when we got there. So we drove out, found parking, unloaded, walked to the building, and entered our room to find that rollaway, along with someone’s luggage. As in, we were assigned to a room someone was already in.

So we call the front desk and explain the issue to them. And that’s when they start laughing. And like listen, it was kind of funny! But it was also 10:30pm and we were in a stranger’s room. So we are asked to come back to the front desk. Is there a way to work it out over the phone so we don’t have to reload the car? No! So walk back, pack it up, drive back to the front desk, round two.

Now the manager at the front desk explains that “the system is down” but works to assign us a new room, one without someone already in it. And it’s less “I’m sorry we made this mistake” and more “that guest was supposed to move his stuff” which…huh??? Well the manager writes down a new room number and I ask, very carefully and specifically, “this room will fit the 5 of us, right?” We’re assured that not only will it fit us all, it’s a bigger room. Sure. So I ask about the rollaway, and she really suggests that we go to the first building we were in to collect that rollaway bed from the 2nd floor and take it to this other building, because the porter had left for the night. Like, she wanted us to load up this metal bed frame and drive it to our new room? I let her know that we would be unable to do that, like physically unable. She seemed bothered by this, but told us she’d send someone to get that bed, and to let us in to our new room because she couldn’t give us room keys. So we drive to building 2, unload, walk, and get to the nice new room!

The room has 1 bed. For the 5 of us. The specific situation I attempted to avoid! But you know what it’s 11pm and we are tired and every room in our line of sight was empty. So we get our stuff into room 2 so we aren’t outside in the dark waiting for more issues. We call the front office and the manager is talking to us like we went to the wrong room somehow? Even though she also sent security to let us in? And we tell her hey we are exhausted and at this point you’re trying to restart the process again, how about half of us stay in here and half of us stay in one of these other empty rooms, we can figure out the rest in the morning. She yells (!!!) over the phone “NO!” and tells us that no, we paid for a 2 queen room and that’s what we’re gonna get.

So we are packing up our stuff AGAIN and moving to the third room of the night, searching for parking, getting keyed into the room, trying to find space for the rollaway, this is the third building we’ve been to, the third time we’ve unloaded our car, and somehow we are being treated like we’re the issue. We got breakfast vouchers and told that was that. We finally were in a room 2 hours later, midnight.

It felt like we were having to argue and work to get a bed to sleep on, and we were working against the manager instead of with her.

That same manager was incredibly condescending to my friend (who was much kinder than me) when we talked to her about any kind of discount or refund. This manager was unwilling to take any responsibility.

It’s a shame that I’m writing this book length review about this negative experience because many of the staff made us feel so welcome. Specifically we want to thank Max and Drew who helped us that night. The staff in the kitchen were so friendly! But after that check in night, and the repeated encounters with that specific manager in particular, we can’t recommend...

Check In Experience : Timely welcome message from the reception staff that the will keep us keep waiting for me and have the room is ready. I was told repeatedly to go look at the self-check-in options, even though my name would not appear in the reservation system, despite all those welcome exchanges on text, the issue seems to be with my request for a accessible room. They did not make it available on the self- checked kiosk so a person who has those accessibility challenges has to be the one who would not have self check in enabled.

Room : The room was clean and near, well laid out. One feedback is the the Wi-Fi connectivity details could be displayed prominently in room itself, same way the Garbage disposal protocol could be written, as they emphasise leaving a clean room at the time of Check out. It would. E helpful if they could place a microwave in the room

Restaurant & Tavern : We had a breakfast in the restaurant and had lunch at the tvern. The restaurant itself was very friendly. They provided me an option for an Alacarte and a buffet breakfast. I picked the buffet. The food was reasonably priced. They had a scrambled eggs, and the most important thing to mention is it was thoughtfully made, keeping the vegetarians in mind. So someone who wants a bacon, you get that and someone who is a vegetarian, you get that with a plant-based protein.They did provide me the the different types of bread bagel and all those stuff that you find in any hotel. They had cutfruits. They had a choice of coffee, tea and the chocolate drink available. They had pastries available and and overall the spread of the buffet was something that I did not expect to be this good. The attendants were so obliging especially the person who was hosting us in the breakfast table. I'm sorry gentleman , I forgot to take your name. He made sure that when my wife went and said that she liked the taste of the pastry. He was kind enough to pack a few more. and then there was juice available for juice fruit juice, like orange, and I think Apple was the second one that was there and then there was also yogurt. There were at least two flavors of yogurt that I don't know seeing. Lunch at Tavern also was good as they had kept the vegetarian foodies in mind and they offered burger with an impossible party. I got a side with chips and I got a side that had a black bean and corn salad. I think the black bean and corn salad was yummy. My family loved having their food so overall, I think the proximity of the Lodge to the marketplace and to all the shuttle inf infrastructure and the visitor center of the Grand Canyon was awesome so I would rate four out of five barring the check-in experience everything else when smooth and I think it was a very memorable stay at Devap lodge in...

The room was overall clean and the king-size bed very comfortable. The shower/toilet part of the bathroom (separate from the sink/closet area) was well-worn but still acceptable in my opinion. I think the room might've been noisy if not for leaving the fan running, which created good white noise that largely drowned out any sounds from the hallway, building door (we were on the end), or other guests; the thermostat worked well to keep the room comfortable despite the fan continually running (i.e., never too hot nor too cold on autumn days when the temps got into the upper 70s/low 80s during the day and 30s at night). We stayed 3 nights and did not make use of housekeeping services. There was a Keurig coffeemaker and some decent k-cup options, as well as a fridge large enough to store a couple gallons of water + other drinks. Overall the highlight of this place (and what the price reflects) is its location - you really can't beat it in terms of convenience, right on the Blue Shuttle line and therefore with very easy access to all sorts of spots along the South Rim. It starts running at 5:00 AM (though when we visited, the park was understaffed on shuttle-drivers which meant a few early shuttles didn't run - obviously this isn't within the hotel's control). Taking those early shuttles really helped with beating the crowds, and for that I was especially grateful for the location. The walk from Yavapai to the South Rim Trail would be fairly easy for almost anybody, excepting perhaps very small children or more frail folks (there are paved options that I think would be fine for wheelchairs and strollers). The lights are kept low at night, so you can get some nice views of the stars. We had frequent wildlife visitors (elk, deer, javelinas, woodpeckers). Parking was abundant in October; I can't speak to higher volume times of year but it did seem there were lots of parking options. We really enjoyed the Yavapai Lodge Tavern for a meal on our last night (it was our favorite meal while visiting the Grand Canyon). Additionally, it was super convenient to have a general store (with groceries and clothing options), post office, and even small library right on site. Overall I would definitely recommend this place for comfort and convenience, and we saw a range of groups enjoying it including young couples, families, and older adults. It may not be as good of an option if you're looking for a higher end experience or on a tight budget, but factor in the time and gas you'll save when deciding whether to stay farther outside the park...